1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to wireless telecom, and in particular to location based systems (LBS).
2. Background of Related Art
The current location of wireless devices at any given time, or even past locations of wireless devices, is commercially valuable information. However, while it provides an important tool to commercial enterprises (e.g., for use in marketing), it also raises privacy concerns. Significant rules and standards have been established in the wireless device industry to protect a user's privacy, e.g., a user of a wireless device typically may choose to enable or disable location of that wireless device giving the user an ability to choose to permit location of their device in the first place. With permitted use of location technology, a mobile operator or carrier then has the ability to make use of such location information, including sale of such location information, subject to respective permissions of its subscribers. As a result, mobile operators and carriers enjoy significant revenue from the sale or license of location information of its subscribers, thus defraying the cost of the network, ultimately benefitting the subscribers.
A cell site in a particular mobile operator's network has a unique identifier code associated with the cell site—referred to as a Cell-ID. This Cell-ID is usually provided by the Radio Network Controller (RNC). Depending upon the operator, Cell-IDs transmitted to proximate mobile devices are associated with an area ID or Cell Name to form a unique identifier. However, a phone in range of a given cell site can receive the Cell-ID, the Area ID and the Operator ID.
Third parties such as Google(TM) have devised techniques to sniff out and record Cell-ID information, and cross-referencing that sniffed Cell-ID information to known locations, to identify a general location of mobile operators Cell-IDs. Google(™), for example, has collected a Cell-ID database that it provides to developers so applications on handsets can determine the approximate location of the user. In addition, Google(™) uses the database to provide more precise location technology in conjunction with its own Assisted GPS server. This provides a technique that determines a general location based on the Cell-ID that the wireless device receives from the network. This bypasses the mobile operator, and deprives them of an important source of revenue, ultimately putting pressure on the mobile operator resulting in raised costs to the subscriber.
In particular, third parties such as Google(™) have independently mapped operators' cell site information by associating a location (longitude and latitude) with a Cell Site identifier code—Cell-ID. Each mobile operator's cell site provides a unique identifier code that is received by a handset, sometimes in conjunction with an Area ID code as well. Thus, knowing the Cell-ID and Area ID for a particular mobile operator, a third party can associate an approximate location with the Cell-ID. This is usually accomplished by having a client in a GPS enabled handset that receives the Cell-ID information, and associating the Cell-ID information to the GPS location of the handset. As a result, third party providers can then provide location information to applications, handsets, etc. without the direct involvement of the mobile operator, making a revenue stream for themselves previously enjoyed by mobile operators. Perhaps more importantly, the location information is obtained by such third parties who may not have a contractual obligation to those users to maintain a privacy in that location information.
Cell-ID information may be used to provide precise location information when used in conjunction with assisted GPS servers. The location of a given wireless device, whether imprecise or precise, may be determined without the direct assistance of the relevant mobile operator.
Without the need to rely on mobile operators for provision of location of given wireless devices, third parties need not pay the relevant mobile operators for location data. Thus, mobile operators are excluded from the value chain for location information, missing out on significant revenue. And perhaps more important to the users themselves, private information of the user, i.e., their location, cannot be controlled as third parties have the ability to determine a location of subscribers who are not their subscribers, thus raising serious privacy concerns.